The field of the invention relates generally to communication systems and, more particularly, to antenna assemblies that may be used with such systems.
At least some known communication systems, such as, for example, radio broadcasting systems and satellite communications systems, use antennas to transmit and/or receive signals. At least some known antennas, such as high directivity antennas or beam antennas, can channel electromagnetic waves in at least one direction to facilitate increased performance while transmitting and/or receiving signals. Moreover, high directivity or beam antennas can substantially prevent interference from unwanted sources while transmitting and/or receiving signals. Due to significant losses for scanned beams, some high directivity antennas, such as reflector antennas, are limited to operations that are close to their boresight direction. In order to fill a large scan volume, the antenna may need to be physically rotated, which can be time-consuming and physically taxing.
Rather than using one antenna, a large physical area can be filled together with an array of many individual antenna elements. In order to eliminate grating lobes that substantially degrade directivity, the spacing between each of the individual antenna elements need to be kept to a fraction of a wavelength. As a result, several antenna elements are needed. However, using an array of antenna elements can be costly and the assembly may be complex. Moreover, the size and weight of the overall assembly may be substantially high.